The present invention relates to a sealable door for example for a rail car of a type which is arranged to tighten towards the rail car so that the door is sealed and locked.
Freight box rail cars and the like are used to transport items across distances which vary in environment and topography. The doors on rail cars are generally mounted on rails which allow a door to slide horizontally to allow access to the inside of the rail car or to restrict access to the inside of the rail car. These doors are relatively large in stature and are made of metal since the loads carried within the rail cars can be large so the doors must be able to accept large items. The doors must also be durable due to the movement of the items within the rail car during transportation and due to the conditions surrounding the rail car during transportation. The conditions can consist of the elements such as rain, snow, wind and other weather conditions which can damage the items, and the conditions can consist of animals such as rodents entering the rail car which also can damage the items. A rail car door must also be able to be locked so that the items within the car are protected from theft and the like.
Some examples of doors of this type are found in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,978,618 (Malo), 4,114,935 (Malo), 4,608,777 (Okamoto), 4,751,793 (Jenkins et al), 3,788,007 (Bailey), 4,091,570 (Favrel) and 5,142,823 (Brandenburg et al) which in general disclose a sliding door or the like arranged to enclose an area such as a rail car. The doors do not create a seal about an entrance so that water or the like may not enter, so that if a load such as paper is being hauled within the car, it is not protected and could be damaged. The doors have a locking device for locking the door either to close or to open an entrance. Another example of a sliding door of this type which does provide a seal is in U.S. Pat. No. 5,647,558 (Kober) which is arranged to provide a sealing door construction for a purpose built rail car. However this is not suitable for replacement type door on an existing sliding door type rail car.
Some examples of locking devices are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,852,918 (Allen), 4,763,385 (Furch et al), 3,820,283 (Acerra et al), 4,776,619 (Daugherty et al), 4,296,956 (Colombo) 5,056,835 (Johnson) and 5,302,072 (Stauffer et al).
It is one object of the present invention to provide an improved rail car door.
According to a first aspect of the invention there is provided a rail car construction comprising:
a floor;
a side wall along one side of the floor and standing upwardly from the floor;
an opening in the side wall defined by two side posts each at a respective side of the opening, a top beam extending across a top of the opening and a bottom sill defining an edge of the floor at the opening;
the side posts each forming a member with a front surface, a rear surface and a side surface, the side surface defining an inside side edge of the opening, the front surface defining a sealing surface lying in a vertical sealing plane of the opening;
the top beam including a sealing surface lying in the vertical sealing plane;
the bottom sill including a sealing surface lying in the vertical sealing plane;
a sliding door mounted on a longitudinal support at the opening extending parallel to a plane of the opening with the door movable from a closed position at the opening to an open position spaced along the longitudinal support from the opening;
the sliding door including pivotal mounting members mounting the door on the longitudinal support for movement of the door in a direction transverse to the longitudinal support so as to move the door in the closed position inwardly toward the opening from an outer sliding position to an inner sealed position to effect sealed closure within the opening;
the sliding door including an actuation system for effecting actuation of the pivotal mounting members;
the sliding door including two side beams, a top beam and a bottom beam which co-operate respectively with the side posts, top beam and bottom sill of the rail car respectively in a sealing action; and
each of the side beams, top beam and bottom beam of the sliding door including a surface parallel to the sealing plane for sealing with the respective sealing surface by a compressible sealing member therebetween.
The sliding door preferably includes an interior surface extending to the beams and lying in a vertical plane spaced from the sealing plane toward the interior of the rail car which may be arranged to be coplanar with the rear surface of the posts in the inner sealed position. When the rear surfaces of the respective posts lie in a common plane with an inside surface of the side wall, the interior surface may also be arranged to be coplanar with an inside surface of the side wall of the rail car in the inner sealed position. The front surfaces of the respective posts in this arrangement are preferably located forwardly of the side wall.
The bottom sill preferably includes a down-turned flange defining the sealing surface in the sealing plane. A horizontal flange may be provided lying on the floor at the opening and wherein the down-turned flange preferably extends downwardly from an exterior edge of the horizontal flange.
The top beam may include a tubular beam portion and an angle iron attached to an underside of the tubular beam portion with a vertical flange portion of the angle iron defining the sealing surface in the sealing plane.
The longitudinal support preferably comprises top and bottom rails at the opening extending parallel to a plane of the opening. The pivotal mounting members are thus arranged to support the door on the respective top and bottom rails for movement transversely to the rails between the outer sliding position and the inner sealed position.